The Providence Rider [Hardcover]

The Providence Rider was one of my three most anticipated novels of the year, and I was thrown off guard when it arrived nearly a month early while I was in the middle of reading the unabridged version of The Count of Monte Cristo. Only through extreme willpower, did I slog through Monte Cristo before eagerly devouring the latest installment of Matthew Corbett.

It's by far the shortest of the four novels, but it packs a walloping punch, hooks you from the opening, and doesn't let up until you read the final page.

I would highly recommend reading the first three novels of McCammon's epic series before tackling The Providence Rider, but you could follow this tale without the first three novels. You'll just miss out on some salient details and a pretty large number of subtle nods to previous events and characters. Still McCammon does pretty well in providing previous key plot points in high-level detail.

The novel starts out in New York with Matthew Corbett still reeling from his brutal adventure against Tyranthus Slaughter and Lyra Sutch. Against this backdrop, Matthew is quite reluctant to attend a dinner invitation extended by an emissary of the infamous Professor Fell. Fell, however, is not one to take No for an answer. Soon, explosions begin rocking buildings around the city and promise to continue to do so until Matthew takes Professor Fell up on that meeting.

Fell is looking for Matthew to be a Providence Rider, someone who can ride in and deliver a much-needed boon to the Professor. The setting for this adventure, however, is far from New York. Instead Matthew must travel to the mysterious Pendulum Island where the criminal Master Bosses of Professor Fell's empire are gathered for a meeting. As one would expect from McCammon, this motley group of characters are a macabre bunch. Some are grotesque, others creepy, some downright violent, or a combination of those traits. Matthew has gone up against a few grisly characters in past books, but never quite on the scale of this one where he faces off against nearly a dozen adversaries.

I was thinking a lot about first meetings of characters: Watson and Holmes, Gollum and Bilbo, etc. Sometimes when you read those passages you know that those characters will have a powerful relationship, in friendship or adversarial, throughout the remainder of the tale. Matthew gets his long awaited meeting with Professor Fell, although it unfolded in a manner I was not expecting. Still, the relationship between these two is irrevocably changed after this book. Matthew has mucked with the peripheral of Fell's organization before, but when he finds himself in the very heart of it, Matthew Corbett will do as Matthew Corbett does and be a fly in the ointment where he can cause so much more damage.

McCammon's writing is in typical fine form: direct, florid, and visceral. At times, McCammon provides light-hearted whimsical details then immediately follows with gruesome notes, but they never feel cheap or throw away lines. His prose is some of the best out there, and McCammon is at the top of his game in The Providence Rider.

Probably my only caveat is the book's brevity. I would have liked to see more of Matthew's adventures on Pendulum Island. There were times when I felt it all unfolded maybe too quickly. I consider that nitpicking though, because the tale itself is a rollicking page-turner, and it fits well within the scope of this 10 book series. In many ways, this feels like the opening of the second act. We now know Matthew Corbett and we have a better idea of Professor Fell. Now we get to see how these two will battle one another over the remaining 6 books. Get cracking, Mr. McCammon.

BOTTOM LINE: This is a damn fun book that will make you gasp, laugh, bite your nails to the nubs, and cheer out loud.

This is a SPOILER-FREE review that will focus on my impressions as a reader, with little to no references to the brilliant plot points of the novel, which can be found in the book description above. To reveal anything further would be a disservice to both you, the potential reader, and the author of this absolutely dynamic adventure.

OVERVIEW
Simply put, this novel is at once everything you could hope for from a historical thriller, and everything you've come to expect from a Matthew Corbett mystery. From the quite literal opening salvo that propels our young "problem solver" into his latest escapade, to the final sigh of relief that Matthew has once again narrowly escaped the jaws of death, the reader is plunged into an adventure filled-to-bursting with nefarious plots and international intrigue, populated by a cast of superbly developed characters who offer Matthew unflagging friendship, unmitigated evil, and sometimes both.

The novel itself is a hybrid tale somewhere between the action-packed cat-and-mouse game that filled the pages of Mister Slaughter and the layer-upon-layer mystery of The Queen of Bedlam. Whereas Mister Slaughter focused on the brute mayhem and violence that could be inflicted upon Corbett's physical person in his pursuit to uncover the evils of the world around him, Providence Rider takes a backdoor approach in which Professor Fell wages psychological warfare on Corbett in order to first get the young man to acquiesce to his demands, and then to further sink his teeth into Matthew's psyche as Corbett is exposed to the ruthless horrors of Fell's inner circle of villains.

REVELATIONS FOR BOTH US AND MATTHEW
In both Mister Slaughter and The Queen of Bedlam, we saw brief glimpses behind the dark curtain that surrounds Professor Fell and his empire of crime. In The Providence Rider, McCammon throws the curtain back with a dramatic flourish, bringing his full literary powers to bear as we are introduced to a cast of criminals the flavor of which readers haven't tasted since the days of Dickens. By turns seedy, snide, sinister and sexy, the sheer pageantry of villainy on display here is both devilishly fun and truly harrowing (including a fiendishly clever first meeting of Corbett and the Professor). For as we revel in our look behind Fell's curtain, so too does Matthew pale at it. How will he get away this time? HOW?! That's the question we look forward to asking when we crack the cover of the latest Corbett mystery, and The Providence Rider offers it aplenty in a deftly woven narrative that keeps us guessing and turning pages until the very end.

Brilliant plotting aside, the other half of his book's coin is character. The characters in this book leap off the page. The situations are, of course, improbable to put it mildly, but it is Matthew's character, as well as those of his supporting cast that ground us, that make it real for us. Matthew Corbett is no superman. He's simply a young man doing his best to survive when he (as per usual) gets in over his head, which as he well knows is the only way to dig deep enough to uproot evil at its source-- that place where there is no light to shine upon black hearts save the fire that burns within Matthew himself.

HOW DOES IT COMPARE TO THE OTHER BOOKS IN THE SERIES?
It holds its own with the best of them. Speaks the Nightbird was rich in historical detail, atmosphere and mystery. The Queen of Bedlam had a multi-mystery plot, great action, and our first peek into Professor Fell's world. Mister Slaughter was a brilliant, brutal punch in the gut. Providence Rider shares the best qualities of its predecessors while being a wholly unique tale, a story of intrigue with an explosive finale that will leave both you and our protagonist reeling.

CAN I PICK THIS UP WITHOUT HAVING READ THE OTHER BOOKS IN THE SERIES?
Absolutely, though I'd personally recommend against it. McCammon does a brilliant job revisiting the touchstones in Corbett's career as a problem solver which have heretofore impacted him both personally and professionally, but to jump in now would deprive the first-time reader of experiencing the many triumphs and tragedies which have befallen Matthew prior to this novel, and which have engendered in his constant readers the devotion not only of a fan, but of a friend. Because at this point, that's what McCammon has made Matthew Corbett into. He is the friend you root for. The one you need to win out against the encroaching darkness, because more than anything, he reminds us what faith in one's self, as well as the faith of our friends, can achieve.

Here's a couple of my favorite lines from the book, which perfectly encapsulate the spirit of both Matthew Corbett, and the novels themselves:

"By now he was used to kicking over ordinary rocks and finding extraordinary horrors scuttling from underneath them in a desperate search for the protective dark."

"But, of course, following the unknown road was part of his business. His nature, also."

Do yourself a favor and enter Corbett's world. There's much darkness in it, but he's left a light on for you to read by.

This is the latest installment in the Mathew Corbett series.
In this novel we meet Matthew's nemesis, Professor Fell.
I love how Matthew is growing throughout the series. At first in "Speaks the Nightbird" Matthew is uncertain and a bit naive. As the series continues, he is learning and becoming more and more sure of himself. As he takes part in the scarier and darker side of life,as in "Mister Slaughter" he becomes more hardened, more worldly. Now in his latest, Matthew is reminding me of that old Nietzsche quote: "Battle not with monsters, lest ye become a monster, and if you gaze into the abyss, the abyss gazes also into you."
Will Matthew survive this look into the abyss? You will have to read it to find out!

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